How To Read Aloud: Revolutionary IMprov Prose

A young relative of mine was “feeling frustrated”. She said: “Oh how I just love being able to read fast and clearly in my head, but if I’ve got to read aloud it’s as if my tongue can’t cooperate with my mind and I stutter like a lunatic..urgh!”
I responded:

You stutter and stammer and feel frustrated when you read aloud because you’ve fallen into the trap of the modern world that says “Faster is better.”

It’s not.

Would you rush a sunset?
Would you hasten the first spring song of a robin?
Would you demand that the maple’s leaves turn bright crimson faster?

The written word, spoken aloud, is meant to be caressed and savored and enunciated and appreciated. Reading out loud is not a race to see how fast you can impart information, but a performance to see how movingly you can paint a verbal picture of what the writer intended, with the word pallet given to you.

Slow down.
Breathe.
Emote.
Experience.
Enjoy.

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Still: Romantic Improv Haiku

I breathe peaks’ rare air;/
eat anti-oxidants. She/
takes my breath away.

Type A To Z: Revolutionary ImproVerse Haiku

How can a Type A/
tell me, a Type Z to breathe?/
To relax? *To chill?
Or
*I am!

Peacefully Sleeping: Romantic ImproVerse Haiku

Maybe I don’t need/
to sleep with you. I can just/
listen to you breathe.

OR
Maybe I don’t need/
to sleep with you. I find peace/
lis’ning to you ______________. [insert appropriate ending]
breathe.
snore.
moan.
talk.
read.
think.
sigh.
laugh.
crunch.
stir.
slumber.

Alone Time: Romantic ConTEXTing Poetic Lament

Her last 1/
would come/
2 c her once weekly/
mayb./
Now she needs/
2 breathe:/
More alone time./
So/
altho/
it’s no crime,/
my demand/
is out of hand./
I grieve/
and leave!

Why the Desire for Sparks from a Fire? A Romantic Poem

As I stoked a dying fire,
A warmth set to soon expire,
I added more fuel: dried wood.
Gave coals space to breathe, good.

And as I watched pine
Smoldering there,
Wood slowly warming,
Yearning for air,

It gave me pause;
Made me wonder why
Women look for passions’ cause
And ask for “sparks to fly”.

Sparks flying mean only
The flame’s been disturbed, goaded,
Kicked, poked, prodded, turned,
Or that super-heated sap exploded.

Instead shouldn’t they look for
The smoky, slowly-warming feat
That finally gasps air, and with a roar
Throws off constant, strong, radiant heat?

No sparks there
Kicked, thrust, thrown at random
Into the night air
With sudden, reckless abandon!

But rather glowing, red,
Steady, comforting heat.
Passions’ flame which, carefully fed,
Gives warmth that will repeat.

Why You Should Go To Bed: A Revolutionary IMprov Sonnet

Instead of staying up
and caterwauling
and denying my busting nut
by not late-night calling,

Why don’t you instead
do what you should:
Go to bed!
Sleep is good!

So, go to your soft, king sized, where
warm exists, if only in part,
because he’s already there,
leaving dutch oven tarts.

And you can breathe deep, and drink
to my memory, and in the stink.